Desire
by Akkenai Natsumi
Summary: Neji Hyūga has always been one for staying calm but when a certain medic is around he can't help but glare at anything that comes within two feet of her.
1. Observations

Chapter 1: Observations

It was a beautiful day in Konoha. The sun was out, the breeze helped cool the hot summer day, and the citizens were bustling about; along with a certain pink-haired medic.

The Godaime Hokage's apprentice was enjoying the sounds of the city on her way to talk to her shishou. She passed by two elderly women who waved and smiled, which she returned.

"Oh! Look at Sakura, she's always just smiling and waving! What a polite girl!" exclaimed one of the elderly women.

"I couldn't agree more! It's such a shame she hasn't gotten herself a man yet." The other elderly woman tsked.

Sakura couldn't help but overhear the two women talking about her and her nonexistent love life. _'Its not like I don't try!'_ Sakura thought. _**'Yeah! Practically every guy we make a move on, gets scared and runs away!' **_exclaimed Inner.

"I can't be that scary, or is just because I'm weird?"

"Who's scary and weird?" a baritone voice vibrated behind her

"Oh, Shino! You scared me half to death!" Sakura exclaimed while touching Shino's arm. Shino seemed to tense and check the surroundings for something.

"Shino? Are you o.k.?" Sakura asked concerned getting even closer.

"U-um" Shino's voice went up a few octaves. "I-I h-have to g-go. Super busy with clan stuff!"

Sakura watched dumbfounded as Shino ran away a cloud of dust in his wake. Something strange was definitely going on Shino never stuttered. _'Wait, isn't the Aburame compound the other way? Oh well on to Shishou.'_

**xxxxxxxxxxx**

Sakura knocked on the door as she arrived to the office. But what was really strange that it was dead quiet. Usually you can here her mumbling about how stupid something was, snoring, telling Shizune to get her more sake, or yelling at someone.

"Enter." Came the curt reply

When she opened the door she came to the conclusion as to why it was so quiet. Hyūga Neji was in the office as well. He was in ANBU uniform, so she assumed he had just returned from a mission. But what was even stranger was that he looked nervous, Neji was always calm and collected.

"Ah, Sakura there you are! I was beginning to wonder if you had been kidnapped" her shishou, Tsunade, expressed her concern while looking at Neji from the corner of her eyes.

Now Sakura was even more confused. So many questions worked their way into her head. Why was Neji here? Why did shishou look at Neji when she said something about me being kidnapped? Why did Neji seem nervous when I walked into the door? Though those questions could wait to be analyzed after she heard what Tsunade had to say.

"Now, I'm going to make this short and sweet." Tsunade started out saying "This isn't about a mission, this is about all the boys that seem to magically have their chakra sealed away."

"Madam Hokage—Don't interrupt me again boy, for it may be your last words ever again!" exclaimed Tsunade after Neji tried to say something.

"Anyway, to say why you are both here. These boys are so scared to say anything about who did this to them, but whenever Sakura's name is mentioned in healing them. They go wide-eyed and frantically scramble away saying that he will kill them." Sakura looked at her shishou strangely.

"Why would they be scared of me healing them, I'm the second best medic nin in the world only behind you shishou. And who is this man they are scared is going to kill them if I go near them?" Sakura asked fully confused.

"That's what I thought so I decided to give the last one some truth serum to see why this kept happening." Right after Tsunade said that Neji started to fidget under her scrutiny. "And do you know what he said?" Tsunade asked expecting us to know, but she just kept looking at Neji.

"Shishou, can you just get on with it please." Sakura pleaded.

"Well, he said that right after talking to you a certain someone in this room found him closed off his chakra stream, and threatened that if he ever went near you again he would do something much worse." Tsunade explained

"YOU?!" Sakura shouted accusingly at the Hyūga Clan member "You are the reason why every guy I talk to runs away scared out of their minds?"


	2. Repercussions

**A/N: Sorry about the wait but I was having trouble with the website it wasn't letting me upload my document. Anyway on with Chapter 2.**

Chapter 2: Repercussions

Tsunade just sat back with a satisfied smirk as her best ANBU captain was being cornered by her very pissed off apprentice.

"You are the reason for my non existent love life" Sakura fumed. Neji tried to look as though she didn't frighten him. She cocked back her fist as she took hold of his vest.

"Now, now. Sakura don't punch him in my office. Take it to the training grounds so I won't have to rebuild the Hokage Tower." Neji turned as pale as a ghost at that revelation.

"Oh of course Shishou. I'll take him there." Sakura said sweetly with a gleam of pure murder in her emerald eyes. Neji just stood there with this petite pink haired girl keeping him in place.

Tsunade chuckled as the last of the blossoms fluttered to the floor of her office. Knowing that she is going to have to take Neji of active duty for a while.

"Shizune!" Tsunade called

"Yes ma'am?" came the meek reply from a mid 20 black haired female.

"Bring me the file of Hyūga Neji. I have a feeling he won't be able to take missions for a while."

"Why would you say—" right then there was giant rumbling and a couple trinkets from the shelves fell. Shizune's mouth made an O shape, and she scurried off to get the file.

**xxxxxxxxxxx**

Sakura and Neji showed up in the farthest training grounds which were specifically just for her and any training partner of hers. Neji just looked passively at her then glared at the tiny fist that was accumulating chakra. He jumped back to the other side of the grounds and waited till she made the first move. Which didn't take long. But what surprised both of them was the flash of orange and green that showed up right in right of Neji when Sakura was about to land the blow.

Sakura tried to stop the onslaught of her fist but she caught the blurs with her fist and they were sent flying into Neji then into more than 50 trees and stopped on a boulder.

"Naruto! Lee! What are you doing here? You ruined my shot at punching that smug bastard in the face!" Sakura screamed stomping over at them leaving holes in her wake. She picked them both up by their collars waving them around.

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto whined, "Can you stop that? It's making me dizzy."

"Oh my blossom! I'm terribly sorry for ruining your punch. I will run 100 laps around the village for my rudeness!" Lee spit in her face while trying to run with his jumpsuit still in her hand.

Sakura rolled her eyes at them. And looked back at the man still imprinted into the boulder. But he wasn't there-he disappeared.

"Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked, "Why were you about to hit Neji?"

"Apparently he has been the reason no guy wants anything to do with me!" Sakura seethed through clenched teeth, her eyes sparking with fire.

"Oh my dear blossom that would be because he likes you. He has liked you since that mission you two went on." Lee explained, "He becomes so jealous when he sees you with other guys, so he goes and threatens them after they are alone."

"What?" Sakura asked completely taken aback, "He likes me? Why didn't he say anything?!"

"Because Sakura it is hard for me to put my feelings out in the open." Came the reply. Sakura slowly turned around and standing there with a disheveled appearance was her problem. She stared for the longest time, until finally she just ran. Ran as fast as she could to get away. But with an ANBU captain on her tail she didn't get very far.

**xxxxxxxxxxx**

"Sakura! Sakura! Stop running!" She wouldn't listen. She had tears running down her face. She was about to jump to another branch till someone grabbed onto her arm and pulled her into a hard chest.

"Leave me alone! Why would you do that to me? Why would you keep me from being happy and me not being able to know how?" Sakura screamed pitifully hitting his chest.

"Sakura, listen. I know it was stupid of me to keep my feelings bottled up. But after seeing what the Uchiha did to you, I couldn't come to tell you my feelings." Neji began

"What does Sasuke have to do with you telling me?" Sakura questioned poking him in the chest. He sighed and looked down towards his feet.

"Well you see, it all started when Sasuke returned to the village with that red headed chick…"

_Neji Flashback_

_As I walked down a crowded market street, I over heard a conversation between gossiping civilians._

"_Did you hear?" _

"_Oh yes! I heard that the last living Uchiha has come back and he found himself a bride." _

"_Yes, exactly! But it's a shame I always thought the little pink haired girl that always followed him would end up marrying him."_

"_I heard Naruto-sama was the first to welcome him back to the village."_

_As I continued to listen, out of the corner of my eye I saw a flash of pink followed by red. _

"_Oh dear, look it's the pretty girl and the new one." the one lady said pointing in Sakura's direction. _

_Sakura appeared to be in an argument with the girl. I sneaked up closer to see what was going on. _

"_You are just jealous Sasu-kun picked me to be his bride and not him." The red head screeched._

"_Karin-san, will you please leave me alone. I gave you my congratulations on the engagement. And no I am not jealous; I have been over Sasuke-san for a long time. It was just a silly little crush." Sakura replied composed, looking at the fruit offered on the merchant cart. Karin appeared to not accept this answer, and tried to retaliate. _

"_Karin!" a deep voice resonated through the market. "What are you doing? I was looking at weapons then all of a sudden you were gone."_

"_Oh, Sasu-kun!" Karin whined while clinging to the Uchiha "It was awful, you should of heard the things; this-this bitch was saying about you!" _

"_What did you say Sakura?" the Uchiha said menacingly. _

"_I said that I was over you and wasn't jealous of anything between you and Karin-san." Sakura replied_

"_That's not true Sasu-kun. She insulted you! She said how she was glad Itachi murdered your family!" _

"_I di-" Sakura didn't get to finish because she was slammed into the wall nearby._

"_Never speak of my brother again! You will always be weak and annoying. I'm glad I picked Karin to be the mother of my children." Sasuke said quite calm. "You will never be anything to me. You will never be anything to anyone besides the weak link."_

_I couldn't take it anymore. I appeared out of the shadows to intervene, but I was late Naruto was already there along with Tsunade-sama and Kakashi. _

"_Uchiha!" barked the Hokage "What on earth do you think you are doing?" She demanded. _

"_Just taking care of trash." He replied nonchalantly_

"_I order you to let her go now" He released his grip on Sakura's throat and she crumpled to the ground. Kakashi was by her side in a second. _

"_Hn. I don't see why you still talk to her she's nothing more than a nuisance."_

"_Uchiha, You are two seconds away from being forcibly removed from this village to never return under any circumstances." the Hokage threatened. Sasuke just grunted and walked away. "As for you, Karin, if I see within 100 feet of Sakura. I will lock you away for the rest of your miserable life. Is that understood?" Karin just dumbly nodded her head and ran away after Sasuke. _

_End Flashback_

"… No one saw you for two years after that. Then you showed up different; you weren't the same girl that I had fallen in love with. You were cold, but being around Naruto made you happier more lively again. I'm sorry for not allowing you happiness, for my own selfish reasons."

Sakura was crying. She was shaking. She was happy. She jumped into Neji's arms and kissed him with intensity.


End file.
